Another Day
by Sakura's Face
Summary: Set in the middle of School's Out, disregarding all that follows. Fang-x-Max. The Flock settle down with Anne, and Fang and Max finally accept each other.
1. Chapter 1

**Hello my darlings~ I re-read the first two Maximum Ride books today (what can I say? I really hate studying.), and they got me right into the mood for writing. So, a little bit of Fax shall we? This will be taken from around half-way through School's Out Forever, and will discount everything from the later books, and some of the second half of School's Out. No voice for now, maybe later.**

**Disclaimer: Obviously, I own none of the characters mentioned.**

**Please read and review! Sorry This chapter isn't brilliant, I'll try and make it better!**

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Another average day. Well, as average as it could get. As a mutant-bird-kid, no day was ever that average. But living in some massive farm house with a woman who acted like a mum, and the rest of my family close at hand? Perfect, harmonious quotidian bliss. Sure we'd only been here for a couple of days, but now that Iggy has his bearings it was like we'd been here our whole lives. Except he did keep missing the bottom step when he came down-stairs.

It was all too different to me. Waking up in the same bed everyday, walking down and sitting at the same table every morning and eating breakfast as a family, before Anne - our mum figure for now - left for work. It was all too the same to me. Before we'd lost the hous- I stopped. _Live in the moment, Max, _I told myself. _Don't dwell on the past, it's over._

"Max, is it lunch time yet? It must be, I'm starving." The Nudge channel started again, and I glanced down at the small, leather watch on my wrist. "Iggy! Iggy! Can we get lunch?" Nudge had moved on. She was a smart girl, remembering not to ask me for food, but to ask Iggy instead. Unless you want burnt cereal, don't ask me to cook.

Angel was sprawled across the carpet, Total the dog curled into a ball at one side and Celeste, a little bear dressed as an angel, sat propped against her at the other. She smiled happily as some kids show blared from the TV.

Fang was in a big armchair, I could see him out of the corner of my eye. Totally silent, I couldn't even hear him turning the pages of his book as he slowly leafed through it. I didn't have to squint to see what it was, despite him sitting across the room, but the title didn't seem familiar. Probably just something Anne had left lying around, that he'd picked up.

There was one missing. I did a quick count, only four of my flock were here. Fang, Iggy, Nudge, Angel..

_Boom_

It was faint, as if a tiny explosion was happening a couple of hundred yards away. The slight smirk playing on Iggy's lips told me that I just found out where the last member of my flock was. "Gazzy!" I cursed him under my breath, practically running to get outside. If he'd caused any major damage, he'd be dead before Anne got home from work.

I could sense Fang silently following me outside, and Iggy behind him. Wherever Iggy went, Nudge went when she wanted food. Angel stayed watching her cartoon, kicking her feet in perfect time with the cheerful music which filled the room. I shot out of the house and int the air in a millisecond nobody could see us this far out. I heard the others do the same.

Iggy took the lead, flying directly to where the Gasman was, landing gently and waving his hand in front of his face to get rid of the toxic fumes in the air. "You used too much sulphur," he started in a matter of fact tone. "It would have been so much better if you altered the-"

I cut him off. "Why is there only a tiny little crater in the ground?" Normally the damage was much more spectacular, not that I was complaining. We could blame this on Total.

"Because, as I was saying, if you switched half of th-"

"He does not need encouragement, Iggy." I shot him a stern look, knowing it was pointless anyway.

"I was just practicing.." the Gasman muttered, kicking at a small clump of dirt by his feet. Of all the hobbies an eight year old boy could get into, the one I was in charge of had to be addicted to explosives.


	2. Chapter 2

School wasn't supposed to be fun, right? You weren't meant to be lying awake at night, grinning madly because the next day you had school. According to TV shows, books, magazines.. Hell, even other people, it was that hellish place between being a kid and being an adult: a forced torture that came with the reward of getting a decent job. Personally, I loved it.

I woke up early every morning, giving myself plenty of time to get ready, and make sure that the others were ready too. Taking a long, steaming shower was still a luxury to me,having lived for weeks on end out in the open. I wasn't like other people my age. I enjoyed school, didn't take anything, even the tiniest of things, for granted, and saw 'the basics', as some saw them, as being luxuries. Hot showers, clean clothes, warm food, a solid roof over a cozy bed. Living the life.

One towel wrapped delicately around my body, and another around my head to keep my hair out of the way, I perched on the edge of my bed listening to Anne walking around loudly. She did it every morning, hoping that some how it would wake us all up. "Nick? Jeff? Zephyr? Oh good!" She was always so cheerful, and loud, in an attempt to pass it on. "You can get the girls up, right? I'm sure Max's already awake, as always, but the other two are still snoozing away." I could practically hear the fake smile in her voice. I stretched out, flinching as my back and neck cracked in unison, before heading to the large wardrobe in the corner and picking out my uniform for the day. Skirt, knee-high socks and a bulky blazer to hide my wings. Hey, at least no-one could tell I was a mutant freak? Every cloud.

I joined the trudge downstairs, after blow-drying my hair into something which resembled a style, with Angel skipping down at the front, Celeste in hand, and everyone else looking stony faced, and sleep deprived. "Good morning kids." Anne's cheerful voice didn't match the deep purple bags under her eyes as her mouth worked overtime on some high protein breakfast bar. "Cooking for yourselves? As always." She commented as Iggy silently grabbed a frying pan from cupboard and cracked some eggs into it while it heated up.

"Fnick, you wanna pour juice for a change?" He smirked, as Fang rose to his feet, sighing. Anne gave us all a strange look.

"You don't mind walking to school today, do you?" She asked for the millionth time.

"We walk home from school everyday Anne, it can't make that much difference." I replied for the flock, daring them to go against what I'd said. After everything she'd done, we could hardly be picky about something as mundane as walking to school. Luckily I got nods and positive nods and grunts instead, as they continued to shovel breakfast down their necks.

* * *

Trig was the only bad thing about school. I'd never studied any sort of math in my life, how was I meant to understand this? I managed to get by, barely keeping my sanity as 'sin', 'cos' and 'tan' merged into one in my mind. How did anyone find this stuff easy? Geography wasn't too bad though, the amount of practical use I'd had of it made it pretty easy. Then lunch came around not much later. I sat with a girl called JJ, who'd introduced herself to me as soon as she'd seen me. She was nice, so were her friends, but I subconsciously flicked my eyes around the room every five minute or so. I could see Fang and Iggy sitting with each other not too far away from me, and no Erasers. That was always good.

Suddenly JJ waving her hand in front of my face snapped me away from absentmindedly taring at the top slice of bread on my sandwich. "Earth to Max! Hellloooooo?" She laughed as I quickly blinked and picked up my sandwich.

"Zoned out a bit, sorry." I said, taking a small bite. I was determined to make my regular person portion keep me going for as long as possible, instead of needing to eat four or five times as much.

"I said we're all going out on Friday, after school. You should come with us." She smiled warmly, invitingly. "You should see if Nick wants to come too," she added quickly.

Why should I? She wasn't _Fang's_ friend, she didn't even know him. "Why?" I asked, pretending to be perplexed while secretly having my ideas about why.

She blushed, looking taken aback. "Because.. Uh. He's.." _So unbelievably hot? _I heard whispered from one of the other girls. Amber, I vaguley remembered her name being. JJ concealed a smirk at her friend's comment, thinking I hadn't heard it. "Yeah.. You're brother. And uh, the same age as us too, I guess. Ask Jeff too!" She added quickly, trying to cover her ass.

"Sure," I tried my best to smile sweetly, but it's not exactly one of my talents. "Just gotta clear it with Anne first.. Our foster mum," I added, seeing her confused face. "But she should be cool with it. Always wants us to socialize."


	3. Chapter 3

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Clothes flew through the air, littering my bed, floor, dressing table.. Everywhere I looked, it was just another little pile of material. When did I even get this many clothes? Anne must have been shopping without telling me. Skirts, dresses and little shirts with bows. They weren't really me, not practical for running, or rather flying, away from some half-dog mutant.

"What about this?" Nudge held out a loose looking skirt. Short too, it would only just graze the middle of my thigh at the back. Definitely not practical, definitely not me. Nudge cut me off as I started to complain though. "Max, it doesn't matter how practical it is. You're going out with your _friends_. They don't care about how fast you can run in what you're wearing or how high you can jump, do they? Anyway, don't you want to impress them by actually looking female? Guess I can't convince you to not wear a big jumper either," she mumbled, glancing at the plain black jumper on my door handle.

"I can hardly go out just in some vest top, Nudge. They might notice something _a little_ strange about my shoulders. Y'know, the wings and all?" I sighed, taking the skirt from her as she smirked at me, getting her own way as always. "Just go and make sure Iggy's clothes actually match. Fang'll just be wearing black anyway." She skipped off, leaving my room looking like a bomb had gone off in a clothes shop. Anne was gonna kill me if she saw it in this much of a mess.

* * *

With my old, battered Converse gracing my feet, I wandered down stairs. Fang was slouched on the sofa, lazily swinging one arm over the side. He raised an eyebrow as he saw me, and I tried my best to not blush. Note: tried my best. I could still feel a heat warming my cheeks as I made an excuse to turn away from him. "Where's Igg-" Angel cut me off.

"He just wants to know why you're wearing makeup.. Not that it's a bad thing. He likes it. Not in _that_ way, Angel! Oh wait.." She giggled. "Now he just wants me to shut up." I sighed. Sometimes, I wanted the same. Having a six year old read your mind could be a little embarrassing, and it could be even worse when she told you what other people were thinking. You weren't meant to know what they thought.

"Because I'm just a regular, teenage girl. And that's what they - we - do. Nothing suspicious, right?" He gave me a look which questioned everything I'd just said, before taking in every inch of my outfit, from scuffed toe to wavy hair.

"You actually kinda look female today," he almost smirked, just twitching one corner of his mouth.

I took it as a compliment as Iggy wandered down the stairs, closely followed by Anne. She swung her car keys lightly in one hand, dropping them as she reached the bottom of the stairs. Picking them up, she ushered us outside. I wasn't sure whether she regretted offering us a lift to and from our meeting place, but she'd stuck with her offer anyway. A ten minute drive brought us into the middle of town, and from there it wasn't difficult to spot our friends.

It was a novelty for me, having friends. Sure, there had been Ella, but I'd only actually spoken to her for a couple of days before I got going again. Even then, that wasn't long ago. For the first time in my life, I had a steady group of friends. There was the Flock, but we were family, not friends. Family was different. We could argue and fight and hate each other, yet still love each other. I had to wake up and see them every day, every morning and every night. Sometimes I needed a break from them, and that's what my friends were for.

"Max!" I snapped out of my trance as JJ bounced over. "Well, don't you just clean up nicely?" She joked, winking and hugging me briefly. "And you got your brothers to come too!" She smiled at Iggy, forgetting he couldn't see it, and then at Fang, blushing a little as she did. "We were thinking about going bowling or something, is that cool with you guys?" She asked, already leading the whole group towards a massive, lit up bowling pin.

"Sounds good to me," I said, smiling as Fang nodded and Iggy stayed silent.

* * *

"How does he do it?" I murmured to myself as another flashing X showed up on the screen overhead.

"A strike for Jeff!" Some girl I didn't know called out. "Or should I say, another strike for Jeff." I could vaguely see her shifting a little closer to him. She was pretty, not that he would care, and she seemed nice. From what I'd seen, anyway, she looked good enough to be getting closer to him. Then on the other side of me, I had to worry about JJ inching closer to Fang. I was leaning against the ball return screen, pretending to be watching the screen intently, keeping an eye on the scores. In reality, I was keeping an eye on my brothers, Fang more than Iggy.

His remained stony, as per usual, as JJ rested her hand on his arm and fluttered her eye lashes at him. "..strike as well, just like Jeff did. I mean, you could always teach _me_ how to bowl." I smirked, there was no chance of that. Fang didn't share anything, from food to knowledge, with anyone outside of the Flock. Even then, he wasn't too fond of sharing food with us either.

"Maybe I could." I heard him answer, nearly choking on my lemonade. "But then again, can't have you beating me, can we?" He got up, brushing off her hand and going to take his shot. Apparently being good at bowling came with the bird genes. Huh, who'd have known it? That sparrow sitting in your garden could be a professional, if he had the strength to lift a bowling ball that is. Another strike down, Fang returned to his seat, thankfully sitting a little further away from JJ than he had been. Good. Not that I was jealous or anything.

* * *

"So, you and JJ were getting on pretty well." I hoped my comment would seem conversational instead of like I was genuinely curious. Sometimes having Angel around would be so useful.

"What can I say? Nobody can get enough of me." There it was, the ego I'd been missing all night.

"I just.. Don't get too close to her, okay?" Then I felt the familiar rush of warmth to my cheeks. Blushing again, in front of Fang. I'd never live it down if he fund out. Luckily it was dark, only the moonlight through the window and the dim glow of the TV lighting up the room. Fang and I were the only two still up.

"Jealous, Maxie?" He jested, raising an eyebrow at me. Like hell I was!

"She's my best friend, and I don't want you taking her away." My only friend, truth be told. I didn't really know the rest of the group. "That's all."

"You sure?" He said, getting to his feet and slowly walking over to the sofa I was sitting on. It was where he'd been sitting before we went out. I rose to my feet. "Because if I didn't know better," he was right in front of me. My pulse quickened as I took in his height. We'd been the same height until eighteen months ago, when he'd suddenly started growing again and I'd stopped. Damn him. "I'd think you were jealous of her and not me." He rested on hand on my waist, the other lightly grazing my cheek as he placed it on the back of my head.

"I-I.. I-'m not." I stuttered out, before he silenced me in a way I never expected from him. Gently, he pressed his lips against mine, kissing me gently. Taken aback, I was unresponsive at first, until I felt him pull back. It was his turn to blush a little, and I could see it.

"Did you.." Then I cut him off, lacing my fingers through his dark hair to hold him closer to me.


End file.
